An open letter to Chief Warrant Officer Brad R. Torgersen

As you are no doubt aware, The Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell Repeal Act of 2010 removed barriers to homosexual members in the armed services, who may now serve openly and as equals.

You have long held the position that homosexuality is immoral behavior, and most recently made denigrating jokes regarding the orientation aimed at Mr. John Scalzi.

Your moral positions are your own, and I will not question them. However, I will remind you that you are a military officer and charged with the leadership of men and women of *all* walks of life, religions, creeds, sexual orientations, socio-cultural backgrounds and ethnicities. Every single one of these people has the right to believe that you will faithfully discharge your duties as an officer, not spend their lives carelessly, not make them endure unnecessary hardship, that you will care for them with compassion and dedication. On or off duty, you are *always* an officer.

Your repeated statements of your thoughts on homosexuality in public forums create the very reasonable apprehension among homosexual members of the service that you hold them in contempt and will not lead them to the utmost of your ability, will not look to their needs and concerns, and may place them at undue risk. That this is surely not your intention is irrelevant.

Further, your publically denigrating statements regarding Mr. Scalzi are base, undignified and show questionable judgment. You, Chief Warrant Officer Torgersen, are an officer, but no gentleman. Your positions are inconsistent with the values of the United States military, and its commitment to being a service that belongs to ALL Americans.

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“You have long held the posi­tion that homo­sex­u­ality is immoral behavior”

And I will bet my life that you will not provide ANYTHING to back this up.

You really are a psychotic piece of shit obsessed with slandering anyone who doesn’t unquestioningly agree with you. You think you can spew complete bullshit about people, destroy their reputations and incite others to terrorize them solely because they have challenged you. And you have demonstrated that any of you don’t even have anything to challenge what Torgersen and the Sad Puppies have stated as their goal.

And I will bet my life that NO ONE on your side will ever call you out on this.

Ah, so now we care so passionately about “brazen libel,” do we? Well, for the record, Mike was responding to Torgerson’s basically calling Scalzi gay — which is a thing Torgerson actually did, you know, in an act of spewing bullshit in order to damage his reputation, because I suppose Scalzi has challenged him. And which, for the record, is the kind of insult that only someone who thinks being gay is wrong and immoral would engage in. Also it’s the kind of insult you only resort to when you’re 12, but I’d say Mike was generous in not bringing up that point.

Cole interprets something Torgersen says as homophobic, therefore he can write a screed declaring him such.

Let’s make this perfectly clear. Cole is not writing this to convince Torgersen of anything. Cole is writing this dehumanize Torgersen, motivate people to harass him in the hopes of stifling Torgersen, and pander to those who already abuse Torgersen. HE WANTS PEOPLE TO ACT AS TERRORISTS ON HIS BEHALF.

But he’s going to pretend he has the higher ground while inciting abuse based on complete lies.

Probably because calling a man gay with the intent to insult and smear him is by definition homophobic, yes, but do go on.

“HE WANTS PEOPLE TO ACT AS TERRORISTS ON HIS BEHALF.”

Gosh, I’m not sure if this is brilliant psychological insight into Mike’s motives on your part, or just the ludicrous, desperate flailing of an idiot attempting to salvage the wreckage of his argument by giving the term “reaching” a whole new dimension of meaning. I’m going to hedge my bets and go with Door #2.

So you admit sympathies with a hate group, then? The same group of chan-trolls that have called in SWAT teams, bomb threats, that continually harass women developers? That group? I want you to be clear here, since your Disqus profile is locked and you’re anonymized.

The apology was worse than the initial attempted slur – it reinforced the fact that Torgersen thinks calling someone gay is a slur. One wonders how gay individuals who serve with him will feel knowing he regards identifying someone as having their sexual orientation to be an act of denigration.

The attempt to denigrate is the issue. That he apologised (which apology was flawed, on several levels), doesn’t change that.

I’m a retired NCO, were I still in, I’d refuse to serve with him. The lapses in judgement I’ve seen elsewhere in this mess disturb me, but this one puts the last nail in the coffin. I, as a soldier, no longer trust him to be fair and impartial to his fellow soldiers. That he holds a warrant (and commission) makes it worse. He has command responsibilities to carry out.

The core value in the military is reciprocal trust, “we are all green”, etc. He, clearly, sees some of his fellows as less than others. Not acceptable. If he were spewing overtly racist slurs, it would be the same. Whom will he favor? Whom will he disfavor; what will that do to our odds of making it home?

I’m a former junior NCO, and have to agree. I dealt with leadership that quickly lost the trust of their command for just this sort of thing, and this was before we had the internet to expose weaknesses.

Because you don’t like his comments on the internet about a science fiction award and his interactions with a disliked, annoying rival.
Because he made one mild insult. And he apologized for insulting him.

Sir, with respect, that apology was, in the immortal words of Ta-Nehisi Coates, a lameburger smothered in weaksauce. His apology still seemed to maintain that calling someone a homosexual is an insult.

I was critical in that FB thread of going after John Scalzi and was impressed when he apologized. After all the sniping that has transpired (between both sides) I thought he was trying to take the high road.

A genuine apology poorly executed still has proper motivation – he felt he had aggrieved and he was owning that. By dumping on him in this way, in the future do you think he is /more/ likely to apologize or /less/?

Honestly, it would be great if he apologized less, so long as he had less to apologize for. A half-assed apology is better than no apology, but it doesn’t exactly mean much when someone is apologizing for the wrong thing to the wrong people and is missing the point of what so many people were offended by.

Brad meant to insult John Scalzi and then he was contrite for that motivation. He was right to apologize. I’m seeing very little credit for this positive shift in his thinking. (I do think approaching Scalzi directly would have been more appropriate but the two do have a history.) If Scalzi was more gracious this might have gone a long way toward healing the rift. But, no. It’s a sad state when an attempted apology becomes worse than saying nothing at all.

Translation from BT: “I’m sorry I miscalculated the blowback from the general public when called you gay. How about if I say: “You’re not really that low, that you should be called that. and gays are still the lowest form”

If I called someone a bigger moneygrubber than the Jews, and then apologized to that person for too low a blow, would you be thinking that I deserved some credit for apologizing, or would you be thinking that I had still shown myself to be a raging anti-Semitic asshole?

As someone who was critical of Larry and Brad and the entire SP/RP slate gambit, this isn’t coming from a mindless sycophant. I’ve been calling for civility between these principals and last night I finally saw a step in the right direction.

I do give Torgersen credit for apologizing. I’m not excusing everything about his statement but do give credit for having an appropriate change of mind about saying something that was intended to be an insult. I’m focusing on the maturity to say “I said something with the intent to injure” and y’all are focusing on the rest of an expression that used to be considered insulting. I’m more interested in the fact that he realized his intent and tried to address it. That’s getting lost in the fray and it’s an important point imo.

It’s not lost in the fray – Scalzi himself has acknowledged the apology, and from what I can see here, most people on not focusing on the insult to Scalzi itself.

What you are overlooking is that this ISN’T just a matter of “an expression that used to be considered insulting”. It actually reveals volumes about the underlying assumptions of the person making it. Again, the analogy with someone using the term “moneygrubbing Jew” is one you should consider.

I read Scalzi’s post (and commented on it at the time). Considering Brad’s admission as a ‘battler’ and his bulldog insistence on being right over the last month, I think his apology is a bigger thing that y’all do. Apparently.

Furthermore, I think this blowback is going to make him less likely to concede anything to Scalzi ever again which is the bigger tragedy if one is interested in some sort of peace between ideological combatants.

I would call that “apology” not repentance, but doubling down. He doubled down that being gay is *so bad* that even his own personal demon, John Scalzi, didn’t deserve it. That is not any kind of repentance I’m familiar with.

Are you saying that Torgersen is not intelligent enough to realize what is wrong with his apology and is incapable of correcting it on that basis?

An apology is not for the other person, it is for the person who has erred to make reparations. Torgersen has not done so, because he has not apologized to the people he actually harmed. And if his reason for apologizing is because of public pressure, it’s not a real reparation, anyhow. Certainly not one that can be trusted.

Given that what he said amounted to, “Not even Scalzi deserved to be called that,” it’s a really half-assed apology at best, and it still doesn’t address the underlying problem that to him, being gay is a bad bad thing and is an insult in its own right.

Myke, I wanted to credit you here with posting something unsettling in a calm, clear, and dignified manner. You pointed out the problems with what was said and why others could potentially suffer because of it. At no time did you suggest that Mr Torgerson or “abombomb” should suffer “a slow and painful death.” Nor did you invite them to commence “stabbing [themselves] in the head over and over again until all of the cocksucking-sycophant bully is out of your system?” or to “Smash his own fucking skull in with a flail”.

You said what you believed needed to be said, and then you stepped back, refusing to be drawn into what has turned into one of the worst insult fests I’ve seen in a long time.

Excellent piece, but I need to clarify something. As a Warrant Officer, Mr. Torgersen is not an “officer and a gentleman.” That term is reserved for commissioned officers. Warrant Officers are usually technical specialists who need more authority than a senior Non-Commissioned Officer but not the legal command authority of a commissioned officer.

He is still subject to Army Regulations and the UCMJ, and the point that his behavior in this affair has not met Army standards is spot on. No solider is ever off duty, even reservists. I’ll admit that reading Mr. Torgersen’s posts makes me wonder how he reacts when someone else in his unit earns an ARCOM and he doesn’t.

Do we know Mr. Torgerson’s actual rank? Chief Warrant Officer spans four pay grades, from CW2 through CW5. I’d also be interested in learning what it is he does in the USAR.

You are wrong on several counts. The issue of command and commissions has already been covered. Your comment that no soldier is ever off duty, even reservists is also wrong. For example, reservists, unlike active duty soldiers are able to run for and hold political office. And when they hold office, they do not have to get prior approval of their opinions and stance on political issues from the Department of Defense.

And though it was not you that stated it, the statement that warrant officers in the Army are only pilots or maintenance officers can only come from someone who has no clue.

Brad has been flogged continuously for the grievous sin of getting more fans to participate in the Hugos. According to his critics he is a homophobic, woman hating, racist even though his list of recommendations included folks from all just about every walk of life. Y’all need to lay off the fake outrage.

For the record, Myke, do you consider anybody who believes homosexuality is a sin or an unhealthy psychological dysfunction, to be a homophobe or a bad person? Are devout Christians and Muslims disqualified to be officers in the US Armed Forces or Reserves?

As Myke isn’t presently participating in this thread, I might throw in my 2¢ here. I think there are many basically good people who still hold to bad ideas and beliefs, because of their culture or how they were raised, or many other factors. My dad was a good man, but he had a streak of racism that his east Texas upbringing never quite let him shed, and it was present even though he was never personally unkind to non-white people. In other words, people, and even their prejudices, can be complex.

I’d say what determines whether someone is a good or bad person has to do with their willingness to recognize and correct their prejudices as best they can. A repentant homophobe working to overcome it is a better person, I’d say, than an unrepentant one. And someone who, as Torgerson did, would use accusations of homosexuality as a slur looks very much to me like an unrepentant one.

Martin, it is you who is saying that homosexuality is NOT “bad” and that those who hold it to be sinful or aberrant need to “correct” their “prejudice.”
So a Christian or Moslem cannot hold the doctrines of his/her faith and sincerely believe that homosexuality is sinful without being a bad person? Or an atheist cannot believe homosexuality is a psychological disorder (as was the official view of the psychological community until a few years ago) without needing to be “corrected”?
I find that attitude arrogant, intolerant, and judgmental.
And I’m bisexual!

I am not familiar enough with Muslim texts, but Christians have to work hard to find condemnations of homosexuality in their book. They either have to rely on Paul, or ver-y carefully pick through Leviticus, ignoring mixed fibers, tattoos, and shellfish, to find anything. I think they protest too much.

Hardly “glaringly incorrect.” That’s still not that long ago. I’ll bet that it was classified as a mental disorder longer than it has been declassified.
By the way, just because it was declassified by some professional group has no bearing as to whether it is a mental disorder or not. Some state legislature once decreed pi as exactly 3. Didn’t make it so.
kiptw, are you familiar with current Moslem stoning practices? Sharia law? Today’s headlines?
I think we all should be proud and grateful that we live in the most tolerant society in the sad history of Man on Earth.

“I’ll bet that it was classified as a mental disorder longer than it has been declassified.”

This is the appeal to tradition/argumentum ad antiquitatem fallacy. You could as easily claim that people believed the sky to be a firmament longer than they believed stars were distant suns. The older belief is still false.

“By the way, just because it was declassified by some professional group has no bearing as to whether it is a mental disorder or not.”

In point of fact it has every bearing, when the professional group in question consists of mental health professionals reaching a consensus about a mental health matter*, and revising their findings based on advanced research and evidence. This is called science, and its a far different thing than whatever politically motivated tomfoolery a legislature with all the scientific literacy of a soap dish might get up to, like declaring climate change a myth or saying pi is 3.

*To head you off at the pass, no, it’s not an appeal to authority fallacy when the authorities are legitimate.

My point was that one should be skeptical about professional organizations, esp. those in the soft sciences. They are as susceptible to fads and PC groupthink as any other collection of humans.
My experience and study suggests EVERYBODY is bisexual and Gore Vidal was right when he said, “There are no homosexuals, only homosexual acts.”
By the way, a state legislature decreeing pi as 3 does no harm. A psychologist recommending the disfigurement of a person’s body in response to a mental disturbance does.
That website is a leftist shithole. I grant it no credence. Canada more free than the US? Absurd. I will have the right of free speech over free dentures any day.

Of course you don’t. Ideologues generally only hear what they want to hear. I mean, try explaining evidence based medicine to an anti-vaxxer, or speciation to a young-earth creationist. They react almost exactly the way you have.

You can complain about arrogance, judgmentalism and intolerance when — like so many of my LGBT friends — you’re thrown out of your house, disowned by your family, and/or beaten and hospitalized for the crime of being you. In the interim, yes, you are free to believe whatever you wish, even when it is wrong. Just be prepared to live in a world where people who think you’re wrong are willing to say so.

I don’t care if you’re a Muslim or Christian. If you go around making it known that you believe that homosexuality is a sing or a psychological disorder, then you’re violating the standards put in place by the US Department of Defense. If you don’t want to uphold the regulations and lawful orders of those appointed over you, then you are unfit to hold a commission.

If such beliefs were to require treating gay people with disdain, than to my mind it would disqualify people who believe such things from service. The point would be the actions engaged in, not the beliefs themselves, however. I’m sure there are people who both believe homosexuality is a sin, and refuse to use “gay” as a slur.

The phrase “Hate the sin but love the sinner” is often used.
And I find it appalling that some call people who disagree with them on this issue “bad” and filled with “prejudice” and unfit to serve as officers in the Armed Forces and Reserves. To me, they’re the hateful, intolerant ones.

Except Torgerson isn’t having his fitness to serve questioned based on a disagreement, but on his actual use of anti-gay insults in a targeted attack on a fellow writer (who happens not to be gay, as Torgerson knows, proving malicious intent).

Oh my goodness, a “targeted attack” on a “fellow writer”. People have been yelling nasty things at each other for weeks, but this, this is over the top. Uh huh. I can tell how upset you are by the giant smile on your face.

If you call someone gay as an insult, that means you think gay people are bad and that gay is a bad thing to call someone. Which means you’re a homophobe. This is an obvious matter that an adult would not find bizarre.

…think you’re inferring a little bit too much about a persons character based off an 18 word tweet at Scalzi. I seem to remember Torgersen being fairly supportive of the plight of homosexuals in the military.

Even if he were, the fact that “gay” is still something he thinks can be used as an insult against a person (indeed, in his not-pology he makes it clear he thought it was the lowest insult he could make) means he has unresolved homophobic prejudice to deal with.

So roll your eyes and move on with your life. That ‘insult’ was like a 1.5 or 2 on the 10 point scale of offensiveness, there are more important battles than getting your panties in a twist over a crude joke.

And Scalzi has said he wasn’t offended by it, only that he kind of pitied Torgerson for being such a sad sack for resorting to the use of it. I think that’s the general opinion among folks. But as to Myke’s point about such behavior being incompatible with expectations of conduct of a warrant officer — is he right or wrong?

So let me get this straight. You believe that the military is a tradition of “officers and gentlemen”, but if a man holds you to the standard of gentleman (you know…. being polite and considerate — the other “PC”), you consider him too sensitive.

No. Writing an open letter that is potentially damaging to a career to a fellow officer, after he has admitted wrongdoing, instead of privately contacting him…or, if the problem is great enough to write a letter in the first place that other people will see, make that letter directly to his command.
Brad apologized to the person he insulted. Third parties that are not part of it have now gotten involved due to a need to show outrage against the other. This while ignoring the vast amount of racism and bigotry on the side of social justice bullies.

He *didn’t*apologize to the people (not person) he insulted. As John Scalzi pointed out, being called gay is not an insult in his case, it is merely an inaccuracy The *people* he insulted are the gay and lesbian people of the world. In fact, his “apology” doubled down — that they were *so* bad that he wouldn’t even call his personal nemesis (Scalzi) by that term, because it was too insulting…. which is *incredibly* insulting to all of the gay and lesbian service members he serves with, and calls into question his fitness to lead.

Again… it’s perfectly acceptable to be insulting and rude to people whose gender or sexual orientation or politics you disapprove of? That is, again, not the definition of “an officer and a gentleman” that I have come to understand.

Which bigotry is that? The bigotry of refusing to cut you slack for being bigoted and unapologetic about it? Speech has consequences, and bigoted speech has the consequence that honest people will call you a bigot. Speaking of getting over it.

Please, enlighten me. Since, as a social justice druid, I don’t hate whites, men, or straight *people*, but only the actions racists, misogynists, and homophobes, and the social structures that have been created to put them on the top of a social structure that oppresses women, people of color, and LGBTQ folk, I’m pretty sure your terms are poorly defined.

And Brendan Eichs wasn’t discriminated against for his skin color, gender, or sexual identity. He discriminated against others for those factors, and those who saw that objected to that and objected to him having societal power. It was his actions, not his essential traits, that led to his downfall.

Nice try, junior. Now go back to the playground with the other kiddos.

Again, I will absolutely call people out and avoid them for supporting behavior that harms people and oppresses them. That is a consequence of actions that hurt people.

It is not any part of the concept of “free speech” that speech does not have consequences. What is new is that now the speech of privileged people who use their privilege to oppress is now becoming accessible to people who can use their numbers to make it uncomfortable for those people to continue to oppress.

Let me get this straight. You end the conversaion when I point out the well documented fact that white supremacy, patriarchy and straight culture unequally benefit white folks, men, and straight people, because pointing out the obvious somehow makes me someone who has an invalid point of view.

Go ahead and try to defend your position. I’ll wait. You’re cute when you’re running scared and using “those people” as a shield to avoid further debate.

The fact that you even are considering “white supremacy, patriarchy and straight culture” as a real thing shows that you cannot be reasoned with and have drunk the kool-aid. That is what makes you one of those people.

There is no “white supremacy culture.” Patriarchy? Don’t make me laugh. As for “straight culture,” that’s called normal life.

sweetie, fish don’t believe in water because it surrounds them and it’s all they know. In your next life, may you be born black, gay, and female. Then try to tell me none of those things exist.

What’s saddest to me is that you apparently have neither the emotional nor intellectual capacity to see the differences in experience between what men and women, white people and people of color experience, and that you are so dismissive of the experiences of LGBTQ folk that you don’t even accord their concerns with any thought. You have my deep sympathy, and any woman or POC or LGBTQ people who are forced to deal with you on any level have far *more* sympathy.

also, and…. fascism is specifically corporate control of government. So let me get this straight. Eichs using his corporation and corporately earned money to influence government to deny equal rights to some people is *not* fascism, but individuals choosing to boycott his corporation for that action and encouraging others to do so as well *is* fascism? Clearly you need to find a new word.

He was not forced out by a boycott. He was forced out by his fellow board members.

Furthermore, you have your definition backwards.

Fascism is a statist, leftwing, collectivist philosophy. National Socialism.
Corporatism. The government is controlling the business. Usually, however, the business owners are also fascists so its more cooperative.
If the owner is not fascist, they are forced to do the gov’t’s bidding.

Your mindset is fascistic because it is totalitarian…..everything for your state..nothing outside the state.

“Teabagger” is not a well-known homosexual slur, where in the world did you hear that? Teabagging, as far as im aware, is a term defined as sexual act between two adults irrespective of the gender of the participants.

You are unawares. It is almost always directed toward homosexuals. Why do you think it was so gleefully used to mock supposedly staid socially conservative Tea Partiers?
Just as “Fudgepacker” is an exclusively homosexual slur but could technically refer to the male in a heterosexual encounter.
Remember, Scalzi is a writer, has a degree in the philosophy of language. He knows what “teabagger” means; it is why he used it against people he despises.

Konrad, you are unawares. It is generally a term directed to people of all sexual persuasions and has to do with people who commit a specific sexual act. It is possible that, among the people you spend time with, teabaggers is used as a slur against homosexuals. That does not make it true for the bulk of humanity. You are not the default human. Thank goodness.

Even if you were right (and you’re not) Scalzi does not share your (or Brad’s) perspective on homosexuals, and therefore would not use it as an insult based on a homosexual connotation. It is not likely. It is much more likely that he is referring to you as being like the tea party followers, which he might consider an insult.

You are, of course, aware that the Tea Parties (there are several) called themselves Teabaggers? As recently as 2012 their online stores were selling badges and bumper stickers that proclaimed they were ‘Proud to be Teabaggers’.

How can calling a group by a name a groups uses for itself possibly be homophobic?

Did you literally just link the very same article I linked above, that demonstrates the Tea Party applying the term to themselves first, in the hopes of showing they didn’t do that? You really should read what you link first.

Read? Really, you shouldn’t tell someone to do something you consistently prove incapable of doing. It just makes you look even dumber.

First entry: Feb. 27, 2009: At the first anti-stimulus “New American Tea Party” rally in Washington D.C., a protestor carries a sign reading “*Tea Bag* the Liberal Dems before they *Tea Bag* You!!” The Washington Independent’s David Weigel calls it “the best sign I saw.”

Feb. 27, 2009
At the first anti-stimulus “New American Tea Party” rally in Washington D.C., a protestor carries a sign reading “Tea Bag the Liberal Dems before they Tea Bag You!!” The Washington Independent’s David Weigel calls it “the best sign I saw.”

March 2
Americans for Prosperity, an anti-tax group, is one of the first Tea Party organizations to advocate sending tea bags to elected officials to protest the stimulus package. Several other lobby groups follow suit.

April 1
Several Tea Party protest sites encourage readers to “Tea bag the fools in DC.” Jay Nordlinger at National Review Online later admits: “Conservatives started [using the term]… but others ran and ran with it.”

April 9
Rachel Maddow is the first to mock the Tea Party’s use of the phrase on her left-leaning MSNBC show. “Even Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina is getting in on the hot tea-bagging action,” she says, stifling laughter. (Watch Rachel Maddow joke about the “tea baggers”)

Except, that’s not what happened. The Tea Partys started calling themselves ‘Teabaggers’ long before anyone else picked it up.

There have been claims by several ‘members’ that this just shows the innocence of the Tea Party in not knowing the name they self selected was sexually related. This seems unlikely due to the number of self hating closet cases the Tea Party contains.

Its not about hurt feelings, remember? Scalzi said he wasn’t offended. Its about the intention behind the remark and the left was using insults usually attributed to a gay action, right or wrongly. It has that perception in the the popular media.

If you didn’t find it that insulting, fine, but you are not the arbiter of what is and isn’t insulting to everyone else. Secondly, he apologized for the low blow which only compounded the issue. Obviously being gay is such a grievous insult within his social circle that he felt it necessary to apologize for even implying a straight man is gay.

Wrong again. You are willfully missing the point and your biasis are preventing you from engaging in a substantive debate. But, that never was the point, was it? Also, pretending you know how people live based off of a single interaction online is as empty as you pretending that you have the authority determine what is and isn’t trivial. You guys must make believe often in that loud ass echo chamber you exist in.

Again with proclimations of the severity of insults? Insufferable. It should be abundantly obvious that what is offensive to me may not be offensive to you and vice versa. Assigning severity to an insult is an exercise in futility. It is completely subjective…
Secondly, your presumption that “sjw” live their lives perpetually angry and outraged because we are passionate about social justice issues is an old, tired one. One that has existed since the chamber was constructed. I didn’t go into this debate making unsupported claims about the type of person you are, you demonstrated as much with your own words. No hypocrisy there.

So writing an open letter that states that someone is not worthy to serve the country because he states that someone else “might not like girls…If you know what I mean” is not over reacting? Heck, Brad is an SF writer. Perhaps he was implying that Scalzi liked aliens or farm animals.

Something said in the heat of reacting to a butt load of crap that Scalzi has said and that others have said…..and that’s all Brad said. And he rates a letter that, in some extreme cases, could be professionally damaging?

As for the SJW….you know what, I’ve found a better term, because not all SJWs should be lumped in with the perpetually outraged, so I will call THEM SJB’s….social justice bullies.

Being passionate about social justice issues is one thing. The things that I’ve seen where people are slandered, libelled, doxxed, and swatted, and now, bomb threats, for not being progressive…THAT is why SJW gets used as an insult.

Declaring that its great that certain people should not be read or considered because of their ideology or some association with such people is why SJW’s get a bad rap

Declaring that all people of a certain race or sexuality are bad, not welcome, or evil, and that “safe” spaces are needed from them….. but still trying to declared themselves as unbiased is why SJW gets a bad rap.

OR…..heck…just look at Arthur Chu.

No extremism is ever on your side. Just ask Brendan Eichs.

Nope..YOU didn’t make unsupported claims….just some from a single encounter on the web. Other people supporting your side, now deleted, did make unsupported claims. At least you guys had the decency to remove him.

The central issue is his belief that being gay is a bad thing. That is at issue here. That is what I’ve been addressing from the beginning. YOU introduced the assigning of character traits to anonymous people on the web. Not me. It’s ok to disagree with my perceptions of Brad’s posts, and you can trivialize them as you wish. However, that does not make them any less sincere. If you don’t think Brad’s comments were homophobic that is your opinion. You are entitled to it and at this point I don’t feel the need to criticize or demean you for it. I wouldn’t make an assumption about your character based on some of the vile people who you share it with. But when you presume to know who I am and lump all of “us” together and act as if we have no grounds to be upset(not outraged, we are beyond that, this is no longer shocking) you fail to understand that we don’t all share your beliefs. I had no hand in erasing any comments nor was I even aware of the deletion of comments. There is no “we.” I am not part of some nonexistent cabal. Agree to disagree. Have a great evening, I mean that sincerely.

You did include me. Otherwise your presumption about whether I am angry or not would be irrelevant. You laundry list of the horrible things sjw does to the innocent puppies would be irrelevant. This is exhausting and is leading absolutely no where. If it entertains and amuses you continue on…without me.

I guess that if the character assassination campaign was going full steam before this, when everything Torgersen had ever written online or in his fiction had been closely examined and nothing offensive had been found, now that there’s this joke (which I agree is a pretty shitty one). I shouldn’t be surprised to see this letter. Never mind that he apologized, or that he and his family had been subjected to a continuous stream of insults that would make anyone snap.

Mr. Cole, it’s great that you are so concerned about injustices that you would publicly call Mr. Torgersen unfit for duty. I must have missed when you defended him and his family when his wife and daughter were being called human shields (because his wife is a person of color, which kind of made the baseless accusations of racism against him look quite foolish).

I must have missed when you defended him and his family when his wife
and daughter were being called human shields (because his wife is a
person of color, which kind of made the baseless accusations of racism
against him look quite foolish).

1. He was using them as human shields. It was pointed out that he had said some problematic racist things, and he posted a picture of his wife and daughter saying “Look, see, I married a black woman! I can’t be racist!” That is, in fact, using them as human shields. Explicitly so. Your defense here – that he married a black woman and therefore cannot be racist, is taking him up on their use as human shields.

2. The idea that someone cannot be married to a black person, or an Asian person, or a Hispanic person, or any other person of an ethnicity other than one’s own and still be racist is simply silly. Go ask any black woman if she has ever known a black woman who has dated or married a racist. Their answers will surprise you.

3. As examples of his racist statements, I point out that Torgersen has said, repeatedly, that the only reason so many women and minorities won Hugo and Nebula Awards last year was because the awards were being used as “affirmative action”. If you don’t see the racism (and sexism) inherent in that claim, then you really aren’t paying attention.

She’s a human shield because he used her as a human shield. It was his choice to respond to people pointing out the racist commentary he has made by holding up her picture and saying “I’m totes not a racist because she exists!” Had he not done that, had he instead dealt with the criticism directly by responding to it, and not by trying to deflect it with her, she would not be a human shield.

He decided to use her as a human shield. No one made him make that choice.

People are using baseless attacks to claim that someone is racist and they say “Wait a minute, if i’m racist then explain this.”

First off, the claims aren’t baseless.

Second, what you are describing is him using them as a human shield. When someone says “Hey, that thing you wrote was racist” and your response is to say “No, I’m married to this person”, that’s using that person as a human shield.

Third, let me draw your attention to Strom Thurmond. The late Senator from South Carolina was a racist. There is no question about this. He ran for President on the “Dixiecrat” ticket, a political movement that was created specifically to promote and defend the racist segregationist policies of the day. He was, by almost any measure, far more racist than Torgersen has been painted by even his most vociferous critics.

And yet, Thurmond fathered a child with a black woman who worked for his family.

John Derbyshire’s wife is Chinese, and he’s been married to her for nearly thirty years. He’s also a self-professed white supremacist who was fired from the National Review for racist comments. He at least had the decency not to use his wife’s identity to defend himself.

You should be ashamed for calling an innocent woman and girl “human
shields” because their husband and father is being unfairly accused of
racism.

You are dim-witted and lack reading comprehension. No one is calling them human shields because Torgersen is being unfairly accused of racism. They are being called human shields because he chose to use them as such. Torgersen is the one who put this “innocent woman and child” in the line of fire to cover his own ass. It was, in fact, an extraordinarily cowardly move on Torgersen’s part.

In addition, he is not unfairly being accused of racism. He is being fairly called out for specific racist statements he has made.

“Along the way we fairly skewered the concept of literary affirmative action — that works and authors should be judged on the basis of author or character demographics and box-checking, not the audience’s enjoyment of the prose…”

Saying that the Hugo winners from the last several years only won because of their gender or color of their skin is both racist and sexist. That’s what Torgersen is saying when he says “we fairly skewered the concept of literary affirmative action”.

Nor does citing to Jemisin, who not only doesn’t quote anything from him

Now I know you didn’t actually read the articles linked to, since she does quote him. The same section I also quoted. Perhaps you should actually read things before you comment upon them. It will make you look less foolish.

But he did not claim that they won due their sex or skin color. He claimed that they one due to their ideology. Most of the winners were people of pallor. There was a mix of men and women. They were liberal and popular with the Hugo clique.

Which is not, as you claimed earlier, Chu criticizing Brad by saying he married them to shield his racism. It was in response to Torgersen’s claim, in Torgersen’s blog post, that he could not be racist because he is married to a black woman. That’s correctly noting that Torgersen was using his wife and daughter as a shield.

Apparently you would rather support someone that promotes hate and whose supporters call in bomb threats….Arthur Chu.

I see you’ve descended to full-on GamerGate lying now. No one knows who called in the bomb threat, or even if there actually was one. Trying to claim it was connected to Chu in any way is a bald-faced lie. Then again, you’ve shown already that you’re willing to lie a lot, so I’m not surprised.

But only his supporters would do it. Allies of the Gamergate people would not do it. I did not say he instigated it even. Way to build straw man.

Only his supporters? Not the thousands of other people on the internet who despise GamerGate? Not some third party troll trying to stir shit up? Not a GamerGater trying to create controversy with a “false flag” call? Or a GamerGater who simply made up the threat for press?

Please… point out where you can prove I’ve lied.

Okay.

This is a lie:

“They were called human shields because he was told that he married them to shield his racism.”

These are lies:

“No..he did not.

Someone else posted the picture.”

This is a lie:

“The fact that you think he was talking about race and not the political ideology of the winners, which was obvious”

I was incorrect about who first posted the picture. I admitted that. Thus, not a lie.

The first is merely your interpretation and your refusal to read Chu’s other statements. Thus, it is your opinion and interpretation. My difference with your opinion is not a lie. You are acting like a 5 year old.

Furthermore, it is obvious that you have not read the SP positions over the years and thus you declare anything that you disagree with to be a lie.

The fact you call them human shields says more about you than anyone else.

Actually, it says nothing about me. Even those who are attacking me right now are describing what he did as using them as human shields. They just aren’t using those words. He was criticized for some racist comments. His response was to post a picture of his wife and daughter and say “I can’t be racist because of them.” That’s using them as human shields. That’s what the term “human shield” means.

The fact that you think he was talking about race and not the political ideology of the winners, which was obvious shows that you are fixated on race.

Umm, no. He first used it the “affirmative action” line when the Nebula Awards were swept by works by women authors last year. He was specifically and explicitly talking about their gender being the only reason they won. When he started talking about the Hugo winners last year, he expanded his “affirmative action” line to include race, as John Chu won as well as several women. Thanks for playing though.

But even your weak defense of his racist statements would have been a better option than posting pictures of his wife and child and using them as human shields.

EW didn’t apologize for calling BT a misogynist. They just corrected their incorrect information about the composition of the Sad Puppies slate. So no. Entertainment Weekly DID NOT have to remove an article and apologize for the exact same things that (comment deleted) are saying.

Concern troll much, dude? I highly doubt Brad has any problems either with his soldiers or with the rest of his chain of command. You surely must know how military culture works – we tease the hell out of each other. Sexual jokes are frequent and common, and those are some of the most tame sorts of jokes that get thrown around. So military personal by nature and necessity have pretty thick skins. It’s part of the job; almost a requirement.

You’re intentionally twisting a man’s words around, importing more meaning to them than could reasonably be expected, and then setting yourself on a bogus high horse to condemn him. And then, to make matters worse, you presume to lecture him about his duties, which you must know full well he understands completely.

Frankly, this is pretty low of you. Passive-aggressive at best, sleazy and tasteless at worst. And, to apply the standard you used, not the conduct one would expect of a gentleman.

I trust you will just do us all a favor and shut the hell up in the future.

Wow. To think that someone with that sort of attitude might command sailors at one point. If you’re okay with propagating an atmosphere where sexual jokes are frequent and common, then that doesn’t speak well to your abilities as a leader.

Might command sailors? Most Chiefs do, indeed, command sailors. They also have their fingers on the pulse of their units/commands. The Navy is dying under the weight of political correctness. Homosexuals are destroying morale and unit cohesiveness. Women on ships are contributing to this problem. Telling the Chief to suck it up and follow command dictates won’t change a thing. The Chief is responsible for preparing his men, and women, for naval combat. Following the dictates of political correctness will only result in lessening of readiness.
Semper fi

LCDR would translate to Lieutenant Commander otherwise known in the Navy as an O-4. If he’s on subs as his bio suggests, than he’s either an XO or Eng if at a sea command, and who knows what at a shore command.

As for Chiefs commanding men… Officers command. That’s what they’re commissioned to do. Chiefs are on the deckplates leading, training, and guiding sailors, but the military has a very specific definition in terms of “command”.

Making sure each and every sailor in the command is comfortable working with the other sailors in his unit is the responsibility of both the NCO support channel and the Chain of Command. The days of calling a junior sailor a “fag” and other such bullshit is over and done with. It has no place in a professional setting.

You either know nothing about the Military, or spent so little time that you never got around to learning anything. Chiefs run the Navy, not Officers. Chiefs have their fingers on the pulse of the enlisted crews, not Officers. Command is a word thrown around very lightly by people who understand nothing about the military.
The very concept of making sailors “comfortable” would be laughable to the men who ran the Slot; crossed the Spanish T at Manila; and drove convoys through U-boat infested Atlantic waters. There is no room for comfort when training for the day missiles may be fired at your puny warship from approaching Backfires. At that moment, it will be iron wills and training that MAY save a ship, and most certainly NOT comfort for the “fags”.
Semper fi

Says the man who keeps quoting Semper Fi at me like the Marines have anything to do with this.

I already said Chiefs were the ones interfacing with, leading and training sailors. Chiefs are out on the deckplates being the The Chief. That’s what they do. That’s what COB makes sure that they do.

If you think that the word Command is thrown around lightly by those officers who choose to serve, I want to know what the fuck military you’re in. In the Navy, the CO is the one that makes the decision. It’s his boat, it’s his career on the line. Hence why when the Greeneville ran into a Japanese fishing ship, it was the CO that was called to account for each and every thing wrong his people did. Command is a BIG fuckin’ deal.

The comfort and morale of a crew were important even back during WW II. I’d recommend you read such books as Thunder Below by ADM Eugene Fluckey, where he recounts lovingly his time spent destroying Japanese ships. Read his words and see how important Morale and Esprit de Corps are on a warship. Read about Mush Morton and Richard O’Kane, submarine Aces, and how much they valued Morale and Esprit de Corps, in The Bravest Man.

The ability of a crew to bond and become an effective fighting unit REQUIRES that the people be comfortable with each other. One team, one fight. It doesn’t matter your race, gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation when it comes time to fight the ship, and put into practice every damn thing that you’ve spent months, and sometimes years, putting together.

The CO makes the decisions. The Chiefs command their departments. If you think this is my first time at the rodeo, you haven’t a clue. On paper, officers command. The CO commands. The Chiefs command the sailors, with whom the CO has rare time for. And with Obama destroying the Navy, no intelligent CO is spending one second more with his sailors than he must, for fear of Obama’s GRU.
Comfort and morale have always been important, but NEVER paramount. With the advent of the modern push to elevate homosexuals and women to superior status, that has changed. You don’t know the young men on the destroyers and carriers, being torn apart by the politics of homosexual superiority. You don’t see the women getting pregnant, or calling assault, to get off ships bound for overseas tours, pulling young men back from precious shore billets (oh, and BTW, getting the higher evals, because they work for Captains and Admirals, thereby being promoted despite being worthless slugs)
Effective fighting units aren’t “comfortable” with each other. They love each other. No more! The homosexuals and women have seen to that. Now, suspicion and hatred reign supreme. You have no more knowledge of the Navy than did my son before he joined. If you’ve ever served, and I doubt it, either it is YOU are the homosexual, or you had a cushy shore billet, with few actual duties beyond 0630-1630.
Semper fi

“You don’t know the young men on the destroyers and carriers, being torn apart by the politics of homosexual superiority. ”

The only people I’ve ever seen torn apart by homosexuality in the Navy were the guy who joined up just so he could get thrown out for being gay and the guy who got railroaded by the Navy for getting caught with another dude in the barracks.

Guy 1 is a piece of shit and I don’t care about him.

Guy 2 kicked the Navy’s ass on appeal and rightly got all that was due to him.

Everyone on the boats knows who the gay guys are. Always have. No one cares if the guys do their job, because doing the job is all that matters.

I have Master Gunnery Sergeant chevrons on my sleeves. My son is the sailor. My time may be past, but I trust him implicitly, in his opinions of the Navy’s turmoil and sickness. Some of my comments about women in the Navy are over 40 years of experience, pup. When you’ve seen the elephant, get back to me.
Semper fi

Well, Gunny,, just because department of the Navy was written on your paycheck, doesn’tmean you know shit about being a sailor or part of a crew. Your ideas about the mmilitary are forty years out of date and the fact that you taught your son the same bigotry and prejudice sure as hell doesn’t impress me at all.

As I pointed out previously, you know nothing about the military. I found this to be the case with most junior crew and officers. They live pretty insular lives, bounded on all sides by the day-to-day lives of watchstanders. It is the more senior people who begin to perceive the military as a whole. You know nothing, as you have no idea of history, customs, or courtesies. The Navy was always second best at this, but Obama has driven a lot of this out of the culture. He had to. The alternative was the continuing existence of a service dedicated to tradition and excellence. Those things are never out of date, except for you who’ve embraced the destruction of the military.
Semper fi

Poor little girl. Does it scare you that the men around here don’t respect you? Suck it up, buttercup. If your loyalty is to Obama, and not to the Navy’s traditions, get out. You have no place among men who write a blank check to the U.S., and serve something you neither understand nor like.
Semper fi

Sure, you tell yourself that, as you watch the iron traditions of the Navy thrown to the side, eliminated in the name of political correctness. Look around you, see the world. The services that have adhered to their traditions are those respected in the world. Those who’ve eschewed tradition and custom rapidly lose their capabilities, and the respect of the rest of the world’s military forces.
Semper fi

“See the world”? You have no idea whatsoever who is respected in the world.

Here’s news to you: Without the science you condemn as “political correctness”, you would be rowing, and be armed with sticks. But then again, that would be much better than entrusting a hate-filled ignorant devoid of any respect for freedom and government by the people with the defense of the very institutions he holds in contempt.

Of course I know who is respected, militarily, which is what we’re speaking of. Do you suppose that in 26 years of active duty, I went through time with blinkers on? The Marine Corps constantly talks to us about enemies, past, present, and potential. And, having served with British, Ghurka, Dutch, Thai, Japanese, Korean, Greek, and Argentine military forces, I know precisely who is respected (and/or feared) and who is not! You haven’t a clue as to what I know, or what I have studied.
Semper fi

You should stop believing your own hype. Not having the valor and honor to stand up for transgressions and trying to pervert the course of justice by destroying evidence and lying in investigations may be “doing what must be done” in your eyes, but it is certainly not loved by the nations of the victims. Not by their military and not by their civilians.

Really? You think that the actions of a few tar the Corps? Funny. You should also remember that the Corps fosters loyalty. How about being precise in your accusation? Name the case(s) to which you refer.
Semper fi

The actions of “a few”, time and time again, over decades and decades, illustrates a culture. Yes, the corps fosters loyalty, to the point where evidence is suppressed, the press threatened and standing orders existed until the butchery of Haditha that civilian deaths related to combat should not be investigated to begin with. Which is ironic, because knowing how the corps fosters loyalty, you wouldn’t have to fear internal investigations at all – as evidenced by the Jalalabad/Shinwar incident, in which the internal investigation let everyone go their merry way, while the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission came to a stunningly discrepant result in their investigation.

But yeah, must not question your own hype – if reality clashes with the Corps, it is reality which has to give way. If there’s no cable car on the map of the Corps because getting current ones is too much bother, then it’s the fault of the stupid cable car popping up over night, and if regulations state that exercises are to be held above a certain altitude, then the problem is the stupid regulation, and not a marine flying recklessly at lower altitude. If a bunch of civilians die, that’s certainly not the responsibility of the Corps. No, it’s the fault of Italy for dropping a stupid cable in the way of the glorious USMC. That’s why Italy had to compensate the victims. Pity the crew had to let itself be caught having deleted a video of the flight. In contrast to killing people, denying your buddies the chance to watch the hilarious incident is actualy punishable, because it’s an infractions against the Corps and not some outside rabble.

There’s not an incident that couldn’t be denied with a little bit of whitewash applied at the right stages. And as such, there’s little need to actually heed regulations and rules of engagement. Article 1: No Marine ever makes a mistake Article 2: In the unlikely event that that should nonetheless happen, Article 1 is immediately enforced…

Butchery of Haditha? You mean the incident where a Lieutenant possibly saved the lives of his patrol by opening fire on armed men? That one?
You might consider that things happen in war, which of course you know nothing about, not giving the slightest consideration to actually serving. Terrible things, which scar mind and body. Stop listening to the Left, and do some actual reading on combat. Look at the Rules of Engagement, which have gotten our men killed in this, and past wars, by handicapping them.
As for the Italy incident, the pilot was disciplined. So, what’s your beef? Is it that you dislike the idea that pilots might actually love their job and be enthusiastic risk-takers? Whom do you want in our fighters, Casper Milquetoast??
Semper fi

Ah, yes, armed two year olds in their homes. I’m afraid the official investigations don’t agree with you. But then, we should have expected you to be very eager to whitewash war crimes.

Any more lies? Oh yes, that the pilot in the incident in Italy was disciplined. He was in fact acquitted. He was later disciplined for having destroyed evidence – not for killing people.

Enthousiastic risk-takers? More like reckless incompetents, given that he claimed he couldn’t tell he was flying at half the altitude. But if you feel like being homicidally reckless, why not do that at home? Oh, I forgot, that would put Americans at risk, the sole people on the planet with a right to live.

Acquitted, as in the court found him innocent? What is your beef? Did you have information not considered by the court?
had it ha was a meat grinder. No accusations were made, except by you Leftists.
Semper fi

Wow. Are you trying to make the subject of this blog post look better or worse?

Because insulting gay people while pretending that being deeply homophobic doesn’t affect how you treat people? Not a convincing argument.

Also, in terms of your assertion that the “gay agenda” pushed the idea that gay is not a “choice,” I have a couple of questions for you.

First, have you ever read the behavioral science research in support of sexual identity as being fixed?

Second, when you have guys stuck together for long periods of time without access to women, what percentage “choose” gay? Would it be about the number you’d expect if people had options in that regard?

Are you claiming that soldiers that choose to stay straight are doing so only to please society?

Behavioral sciences study… wait for it…. behavior! There is zero evidence that homosexuality is a genetic trait. Therefore, homosexual life is a choice.
In the military, there is zero evidence that men “choose” homosexuality after long periods of enforced chastity.
Semper fi

Come back when you actually have a bleeping idea what you are taling about. An MRE has more science in it than you. Your making up claims about scientific evidence doesn’t make any of it go away. With your level of scientific literacy, I’m sure you spend your time in a lifeboat whenever on board a ship so you can row away when it drops over the edge of the world.

There is plenty of evidence that homosexuality is a genetic trait. More, even if that was not the case, your conclusion that it was thus a choice would not only be invalid, as absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, it would be empirically disprovable.

The only evidence you thus bring is that the military is full of liars and frauds.

So, okay! Show the science. No one has been able to do so, with peer-reviewed results! But, I certainly invite you to show it, which you could have done with a single line of citation if you had any.
Semper fi

He provided several. I provided a layperson’s interpretation of one. You remind me of my mother (who died of pneumonia at the age of 63 after smoking 2-4 packs a day all her life, the pneumonia deadly because of the undelying COPD) “Prove to me that smoking is dangerous” “those doctors don’t know what they’re talking about” “smoking doesn’t harm me.”

Fortunately for you, your inability to absorb scientific knowledge isn’t as deadly as my mother’s (at least not in this regard). It is, however, just as wilfuly blind for no good reason.

Sorry, the analogy with smoking doesn’t work. It had been proved decades prior, in the 1880’s, that smoking damages the lungs.
The links he provided prove NOTHING, because they do not pinpoint the genetic markers you say are responsible for homosexuality. As they cannot be passed through procreation, homosexuals not engaging in such, they would be a dead end, literally.
Semper fi

Again, your knowledge of biology is several decades out of date. Please see recent studies in epigenetics, expression of genes due to prenatal circumstances, etc. You’re awfully sweet, but awfully ignorant as well, and you have toilet paper stuck to your shoe and your fly is unzipped.

Funny, but I never claimed any expertise in biology. But this argument has been going on since the 70’s, when some researchers claimed to have found the genetic markers for homosexuality. Turned out that no one could replicate their results. Ditto with the claims of 10+% of the population being homosexual. Turned out the number is closer to 1-2%.
But I do appreciate your compliments on my nature.
Semper fi

You are using biology to support your argument. Not having any expertise in the subject, at least to the point of understanding the peer reviewed evidence you have been provided, is a signficant impediment to discussing the subject with any claim to accuracy. It’s kind of like working backwards on the subject of climate change from “I don’t want to change my way of life” to “humans are not impacting the earth’s climate”.

I am using the information I’ve had. I’m not using biology, nor am I presenting myself as particularly knowledgeable in the subject.
There is no peer-reviewed evidence proving genetic marking of homosexuality.
Semper fi

Yes there is, and you were linked to several articles that showed those markers. A part of your misunderstanding is that you don’t appear to understand that genetics change *during the lifetime* of a person based on expressions of genes that turn off and on in response to environment, so it’s not as simple as nature or nurture, but is in fact much more complex, including epigenetics, which is the passing on of *new* traits caused by environment in an ancestor (for instance, Grandma lived through a war which changed gene expression and increased vulnerability to anxiety… she then passed this on to her children).

Your argument at this point has devolved to putting your hands over your ears and saying you can’t hear. And signing “Semper Fi” to that is highly offensive to the good Marines out there who aren’t homophobic bigots with a refusal to learn.

This, for the viewers, is why basic competence in current high school level biology is essential to engaging in the conversations. John, you are so laughably wrong about this basic fact of biology that I would be happy to invite my 17 year old son, who has never gotten above a C in a science class, to explain to you in gory detail the biological facts of the case.

I’m unconcerned with your interest in my level of biology expertise, thank you. Continuing to rail against me, without presenting evidence of actual genetic markers, is amusing, but rather a waste of time.
Semper fi

You were given evidence. Your lack of basic understanding of biology made you *incapable of understanding it*. You would be right about it being a waste of my time, except that you are proving to be an absolutely stunning object lesson for people reading along. Thank you.

*Science* uses “weasel words” because science is constantly absorbing new information and evolving. And again, Biology has changed enough, especially with regard to the interaction between nature and nurture, that it is no longer correct, especially with regard to complex behavior patterns, to refer to “gene x” as a “source” for a pattern of behavior. Again, your ignorance is showing. We’re trying to teach college here, and you haven’t gotten through grade school, and yet you are presuming to tell us we don’t know what we know. That’s why what you’re saying is offensive.

Okay, so when science can point to the specific gene that is responsible for homosexuality, I will believe. Genes don’t affect behavior. Behavior is a choice. I can choose to drink bourbon, but I don’t like the behavior it induces in me.
Semper fi

And yet there are multiple identical twin studies that show that addiction is a heritable trait, as is sexual orientation. /smh. I certainly hope if you do have that tendency, you are teaching your children that they will have to work harder than others to avoid addiction.

So you don’t even understand the concept of a “twin study” in biology? Identical twins are used, and have been used for generations, to demonstrate nature vs. nurture issues. It is a standard research method to determine amount of heritability of a trait. Twin studies have consistently demonstrated heritabilty of both addiction and sexual orientation.

No, I have explained to you how biology works, as much as your brain is capable of understanding it, and how scientists make determinations. The fact that at this point you’ve retreated to silly repeating of a discredited idea of what constitutes proof in biology tells me you are unable to have this conversation in good faith. You do a great disservice to the Marines by continuing to sloganize while walking around with shit on your shoe and your uniform in disarray in the context of being unable to have a simple conversation about science. Good day.

Really? You’re not terribly bright, are you. If you notice (which you did not, lol) I included those who claim to be bisexual. The homosexual crowd is under 2%! I claimed 1-2%. I’ll accept I may have been a bit low, but it still is FAR from the 10% which the homosexual crowd has insisted upon in the past.
Semper fi

I thought you were going to pull back but Nope, dived right back in with some shitty statistical analysis. Cherry picking of data, refusal to see the limitations of the model, wierd belief that bisexuality people aren’t gay…

If you don’t understand a science, commenting on it is best avoided. You know how the saying goes?

But I’ll ask you anyway. Do you choose all of your behavior? Is breathing a behavior? How optional is that? Eating? Sleeping? Erections? You have a choice in your erections? If you see a centerfold, you can just shut off the reaction if you decide that her turn-ons aren’t compatible, even if she has really big knockers? How about if she starts touching you? If she smells really good? Does knowing she’d make a terrible stepmom for your kids make the little brain stand down?

Studying which behaviors are choices and which are not is part of the behavioral SCIENCES (we call those voluntary vs. involuntary).

How much choice do YOU have over what turns you on, “John”? Does the big brain (the one that drives voluntary behavior) really have much say in it?

And my point is that if sexual preference was a choice, why would men choose chastity over the men around them? I’m assuming there are some good looking guys there. I certainly wouldn’t turn them down if they were my only choice (I’m a heterosexual female, by the way, so don’t get your panties in a twist). Why are the guys CHOOSING to turn down sex? Just because you tell them to? Because someone told them THAT sex is wrong and girl sex is right? Do they have to use their big brains to make that choice, John? Because I would, in a room full of half naked guys (and I wouldn’t have a problem doing it, but the little brain would definitely be going “ooh, nice!”).

And lastly, if homosexuality and heterosexuality are options we all get to check boxes on, why don’t girls turn me on when I see them naked? I don’t recall checking the box that eliminated half the population from my dating pool. Why, John?

Breathing is an autonomic function of the body, not left to choice. Eating is a choice, and people around the world starve themselves to death, by choice! Sleeping is also a choice, and lack of sleep can lead to death. Looking at the centerfold photos is a choice. In general, as an adult, being deliberately touched is a choice. You aren’t very good at this, are you?!
People, men AND women, choose chastity for a variety of reasons. Were you unclear about this?
Semper fi

I am afraid you are a little confused, “John.” You see, autonomic behaviors are still behaviors. Look at Pavlov’s work. Involuntary behaviors can actually be trained and conditioned and are modified by our experiences (and many other factors).

But the problem here is that you spent so much time trying to dodge the arousal question that you didn’t even notice that you basically agreed with me. Because arousal? That’s an involuntary behavior too. You can choose your environment to some extent, but your body and your lizard brain decide whether you are turned on by it or not.

So I think you’re not saying that “homosexuality” is not a choice, “John.” I think you know very well it isn’t.

I think you’re saying that people who are same-sex attracted, for whom “homosexuality” is the only option, should just choose not to have sex or love because you decided it is icky.

And, well, isn’t that an entirely different statement?

And rather than worrying over how the “gays” have ruined the military, why don’t we talk about how bigotry affects society? Because I’m good at that too.

No, autonomic FUNCTIONS are not behaviors. Behaviors may be changed. You cannot stop your heart beat, though you can learn to control the outside influences that impact on it. Same with breathing.
Arousal can be controlled by some, but it is still a function of the nervous system, and not a behavior. And a large number of things can lead to sexual arousal, including mortal combat.
Sure, lets talk about how bigotry affects society. Shall we start with your bigotry against those whose religions classify homosexual activities as sin? Perhaps we can start with your bigotry against anyone who opposes changing the traditional concept of marriage? Or, perhaps you’d rather just drop the subject, because bigotry is a natural human reaction to anything foreign?!!!
Semper fi

Yep, we’ll start with that. Some religions think it’s a sin for your wife to leave the house with her face showing. Is she being a bigot when she shows her face?

And it’s interesting that you think bigotry is a natural human reaction. Because so is arousal, and you’ve classified as a sin for some people. Are you saying that natural human reactions can’t be morally wrong? Or only that you’ve got a serious double standard?

Perhaps it is YOU should start by studying the patterns Pavlov TAUGHT his dogs. You seem to think he started with the results he published. He did not! It was a learned response, which has come to be called a “Pavlovian Response”. You truly aren’t very good at this.
You’re second is so much gobbledygook. Try again. This time, try to quote me saying that arousal is a sin for some people, if you can!
Semper fi

Pavlov paired two stimuli (food and a bell). He trained his dog to have a gustatorial (autonomic) response in response to the bell by the pairing. Classical conditioning. He changed the process by which autonomic reactions occurred.

Behavior or behaviour (see spelling differences) is the range of actions and mannerisms made by individuals, organisms, systems, or artificial entities in conjunction with themselves or their environment, which includes the other systems or organisms around as well as the (inanimate) physical environment. It is the response of the system or organism to various stimuli or inputs, whether internal or external, conscious or subconscious, overt or covert, and voluntary or involuntary.

“CONCLUSIONS:
Results, especially in the context of past studies, support the existence of genes on pericentromeric chromosome 8 and chromosome Xq28 influencing development of male sexual orientation.”
Note the use of the word “support”.
Semper fi

A hypothesis is NOT a proof. It is a guess, perhaps a terrific guess, possibly the precise truth. But it is still a guess, even though based on the scientific process. You’re really stretching. Were I willing to spend the 46 British Pounds, I might be tempted to read the full study.
Semper fi

Seen it? Gravity may be seen by the bending of light, with instrumentation. I believe a lot of things I haven’t seen with my own eyes. I believe that Troy was a real city. I believe in the Library at Alexandria. I believe that Alexander himself was a real person. But I’ve never seen any of these things. Do you disbelieve everything you haven’t seen yourself?
Semper fi

No, it can be seen by warpage of light! There is a formula for the figuring of gravity. And yes, future knowledge may change that. That’s why science is never “settled”, despite what the global warming kooks may say.
Semper fi

No, it does not prove it. The theory of relativity covers quite a bit of ground, gravity being only a small part. The larger part concerns the movement and energy of mass. Newton actually came up with a formula for gravity, which has been refined a bit since.
Semper fi

My experience working with Army transportation units running ships is that NCO command the deck parties. This is no different then when I was a platoon leader and my NCOs ran the squads. The troops in the squad listened and obeyed the commands of their team leaders who obeyed the commands of their squad leader who obeyed the commands of their platoon leader who obeyed the command of the Company Commander who….

… giving commands and being in command are to very different things. There are entire ceremonies devoted to Change of Command. It denotes being the one ultimately responsible for all actions of the unit you’re in charge of. Notice when a 1SG or a CSM changes over it’s called a Change of Responsibility.

The fact that I have to explain this to you, someone who wore a uniform at one point is ridiculous.

While I agree with much of what you say, this: “Homosexuals are destroying morale and unit cohesiveness. Women on ships are contributing to this problem.”, I didn’t see any particular evidence for in my 24 years in the USAF. We were generally more concerned with if someone could do their job, usually under stress and pressure.

I won’t speak for the AF. I knew it as a child only, and served in joint billets. The Air Force isn’t thrown together by design, aboard ships and subs for weeks and months at a time. The Navy cannot afford it, and it has destroyed the morale and cohesiveness of many ships. Coupled with the egregious reliefs of many very popular skippers, the Navy is about finished! The sad thing, for me, is that my son is just getting to like the Navy, after 7 years, but is extremely disappointed at the zero defect, and pro-homosexual/women, climate within.
Semper fi

I just wanted to mention that my son is currently active duty in the Navy, serving aboard a small boy, and his experience and observations do not correspond with your statements here. He serves with a very diverse group of people, some of whom are great at their jobs and others who are maybe not as great as they could be, and the excellence or lack thereof of their performance does not, in his experience, correlate to gender or sexual orientation (or ethnicity or religion for that matter) but purely depends on the individual.

Thank you Kate. My son is off his destroyer at the moment, on shore duty. When he first boarded his ship he also insisted that there was no problems. After 4 years aboard, his tune changed 180 degrees.
Semper fi

My son is in his 6th year and he seems to have developed a pretty astute view of the strengths and weaknesses of the service. Of course every ship is different, but for example on his ship he says that, to put it simply, no one cares if people are gay; it’s a non-issue and has no effect on morale and unit cohesiveness. Any conflicts lie along other vectors.

All I’m saying is that people can have very different experiences in the service, and that in his experience he sees people performing well or poorly based on individual merit and not based on what “group” they fit into.

Homosexuals (and who the fuck calls gay people that anymore? The 90s called, they want their limpdick bigotry back) and women are *part* of those units now. Their morale is as important as the morale of any other service member. The culture of the United States is changing, and if the military wants to credibly claim that it stands for and protects America, it must keep up. When racial segregation in the military was ended, plenty of old guard types bitched and moaned about unit cohesiveness. They were wrong then and you’re wrong now.

Anyone who dislikes the bastardization of the word “gay” uses the word “homosexual”.
Race is entirely different from throwing women into the mix. And homosexuality is a choice, not a genetic difference.
Semper fi

The pro-homosexual crowd took it upon themselves several decades ago, with claims that homosexuality is genetic. When challenged, not one iota of proof could be found by pro-homosexual scientists. I don’t have to prove a thing, particularly a negative!
Semper fi

Oh, my, how would you know that, given that you evidently are completely and utterly untouched by science?

Neither do you understand scientific method, or you would not spread the usual drivel about proving a negative (Hint: It’s called falsification and entirely possible) nor do you evidently know the least bit about the scientific research on homosexuality.

Here’s the significant part: “The cause of some birth defects can be difficult or impossible to identify. Certain behaviors, like smoking, drug, and alcohol use greatly increase the risk of defects. Other factors, such as exposure to environmental toxins, medications, or infections also increase risk. Women with pre-existing medical conditions, such as diabetes, are at higher risk of having a child with a birth defect.”

So don’t worry, if your first kid is gay, your next one might be straight. However, your first kid is unlikely to father any more kids since gay sex rarely results in pregnancy (if it does, you’re doing it wrong.)

Except that homosexuality is absolutely normal and expected in all higher order animal species, including human beings, and has normative functions just as heterosexuality and bisexuality do in interpersonal contexts. But you be you, and tell VD that he’s oozing again 😉

Wow, to think that someone who wears their homosexuality on their sleeve, or other uniform apparel, will command sailors at some point. Humanity survived 100,000 years, Christianity for 2000 and the USA for 200 without seeing a burning need to sanctify buggery. Whether the US or Western Civilization will survive for another 20 is anybody’s guess. But, as long as you can run around in a pink jockstrap with feathers on, I guess that’s what’s really important! I’m sure your troops will still respect you. Might want to wipe your chin first though.

My point is that Myke’s letter is distasteful, condescending, holier-than-thou, presumptuous, and pretentious in the extreme. The notion that a hard-charging soldier would get all in a tizzy because someone he works with or for might have said something that he might find offensive somewhere, somehow, is silly and offensive. The notion that Brad won’t lead his men well because of what he may or may not believe about homosexuality is also silly and offensive.

I find Myke’s letter self-indulgent and abhorrent, the more so because I doubt he gives two shits about whether Brad does well or not, or for the soldier’s Brad works with and for. It’s a self-indulgent bit of moralistic preening designed to make himself look good to himself and his peers, nothing more.

I’m certain he does. And I’m certain he’s a good guy and a conscientious officer (like I said, never met him but I’ve heard some podcast interviews and he seemed sincere). Still, this letter rubs me raw.

Dude, I was overjoyed when Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was done away with. Guy 2 that I mentioned above was probably my favorite junior sailor ever, and he got screwed. Completely. If it’d been a girl he’d been caught with in the barracks he’d have gone to mast and that was it. But they took him all the way to Court Marshall. I testified on his behalf, but there wasn’t much to be done. I was really happy when he told me later how much the appeals court reamed the Navy on his behalf. 🙂

Political discourse and demonstrations? Again, happens all the time. It’s perfectly allowed and encouraged as long as it’s 1) Not done in uniform and 2) Not done in such a manner as to portray that officer’s political views as the official views of his service.

I’m not privy to Brad’s statements that Myke’s referencing here. But if they are in relation to homosexuality, they probably stem from Brad’s Mormonism. I’ll quote the US Constitution, Article VI:

“no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

Yes, you’re right. Sexual jokes are common, but what is the status-quo does not make it right. To be honest, I’ve never thought I would see anyone, no less an officer, fight FOR that dark side of the culture. I know when I was Active Duty it was done but generally acknowledged that it was done in bad taste.

I know both Brad and Mike I think they’re both decent men. I don’t know about what Brad has said recently, and have been trying to stay out of that scene, so I can’t comment on recent events. I will say that I agree with the general statements made in this post. Denigrating statements should be avoided for any group. Take action if necessary to preserve our freedom or prevent the loss of life, but you don’t have to bring mockery into it.

This blog is distressing, and not for the charges you levy against Torgeson. Ever since the success of the Sad Puppies he has been accused of racism, wife beating, sexism and the general appearance of being a bad person. In most of the blogs that I’ve seen his comments, he has been remarkably polite and respectful, even when those he is arguing against are not.

Yes, he got into an argument with Scalzi, and posted a poorly thought out post, which he immediately apologized for. The idea that he said something stupid, something that is often used as a pejorative in arguments gives you the right to be upset with his argument. It in no way means that he in a moment of non clear thinking used an argument that he regretted.

One of the descriptions the Sad Puppies use for those that disagree with their view are the “perpetually outraged”. The phrase refers to the people that are looking for reasons to be upset or are quick to jump on a person for a poorly thought out post or statement and try to use that single event to describe the other person’s every waking moment. You sir, are very much over reacting to his statement, and greatly over reaching in your supposition that his statement in any way guides his life beliefs.

You and Scalzi are splitting hairs. Yes, he said something stupid, and admitted it. Yet that isn’t good enough for you. Apparently because he said something stupid, he needs to kneel and whip himself with strands of barbed wire, and perhaps that might not be good enough.

Again, you fit fully within the definition of the perpetually outraged. You find a single transgression and trumpet it declaring the person who made the transgression the devil incarnate, and then pat yourselves on the back for exposing ungroupthink.

I very much read what he wrote. I thought I characterized it quite well. Torgeson used a juvenile insult, something that like it or not is in the common vernacular. Recently LGBT activists have been trying to get people to understand that using that as a insult means far more than most people want it to mean. Torgeson apologized for that particular insult, and it simply wasn’t good enough for you. Nothing that he says about it will clear the slate in Edinburgh’s mind or yours apparently (Perpetually outraged?).

Hmmm. I am hoping that you are NOT still subject to being called up for active service.

Why is this? Well, by your “logic,” anyone under your command would be subject to realistic doubts as to whether you would “lead them to the best of your ability” if they happen to disagree with your political views.

Which, I would submit is a *far* higher proportion of active service personnel than the number of open homosexuals currently serving.

No, thinking that everyone has to agree on practice is wrong. I can disagree with your lifestyle choices so long as that doesn’t interfere with my command judgement. What you are saying is that everyone has to walk in lock step. That’s not true; I’ve had Mormons, Church of Christ and Asatru under me. I don’t agree with any of them, spiritually, all I really cared about was could they lead and not get my people killed needlessly.

Everyone has to agree to follow the UCMJ, the POTUS, and the officers appointed over them. That’s part of the oath of service.

You can disagree with lifestyle choices all you want, but the minute that you say something that causes your soldiers/sailors to lose faith in you and your ability to respect and lead them, then you’re fuckin’ wrong and I would hope that your NCOs would have the good judgement to call you out on it.

You actually say that? You’re a freakin’ moron and a SJB. Torgersen has made his views on Vox Day very well known. Torgersen does NOT suppress comments either, he just shows them how wrong they are. Bet you’ve NEVER read his blog OR his Facebook page you ignorant twaddlepate.

Congrats, Mr Cole, you contemptible liar and coward. You have just guaranteed that (a) I will never read your books myself, and (b) my bookstore will never carry your books again.
Enjoy your lost sales. But I’m sure the approval of your fellow SJB’s will make up for it!

Just curious if Myke is aware that such a topic, especially involving to officers and/or Warrant officers (who by the way are just as much gentlemen as commissioned dweebs ever since congress removed the ‘gentlemen’ bit when officers grew tits) is considered unseemly and unprofessional when conducted in public… in fact it could be termed ‘Conduct Unbecoming’…why not grow a set and challenge him on it directly when a proper response is an option, not when he’s half out of the loop due to traveling.

Considering that you refer to female military officers as “officers with tits,” I highly doubt that you’re in any position to judge someone on their remarks as “conduct unbecoming” when your misogyny is blatantly obvious.

No longer a service member scooter… curtail both of my grunt speaking gonads.

I have never been, nor will I ever be part of the PC crowd. I was never an officer, chose not to be in fact. I was a grunt, a scout, and an NCO… I can recognize it and (when I was in) abide by the rules. I am no longer in so I really don;t give three hoots in Hades about it.

Myke Cole (Super Spy) makes a point of speaking *as an officer* even though he is about as much of one as I am sitting in the IRR like he is… taking of the false color of authority in order to serve one’s own needs is generally considered rude, if not illegal.

We both know that’s not true. If you truly didn’t care, you wouldn’t have taken the time to reply to what I had to say. But apparently it hit close enough to home that you felt you had to swagger back in here to reaffirm your supposed superiority over women. Whatever. You’re just as pathetic and intellectually anemic as the knuckle-dragging mouthbreathers who use the word “liberal” as a pejorative.

Jerry as a former reserve officer and recovering attorney, I’d have to say you’re on to something here.

United States v. Schweitzer, 68 M.J. 133 (an officer’s conduct need not violate other provisions of the UCMJ or even be otherwise criminal to violate Article 133, UCMJ; the gravamen of the offense is that the officer’s conduct disgraces him personally or brings dishonor to the military profession such as to affect his fitness to command the obedience of his subordinates so as to successfully complete the military mission; clearly, then, the appropriate standard for assessing criminality under Article 133 is whether the conduct or act charged is dishonorable and compromising as hereinbefore spelled out – this notwithstanding whether or not the act otherwise amounts to a crime)

See also

United States v. Ashby, 68 M.J. 108 (the criminal conduct sought to be punished by an Article 133, UCMJ, offense is the act of committing dishonorable or compromising conduct, regardless of whether the underlying conduct constitutes an offense under the UCMJ).

and

United States v. Diaz, 69 M.J. 127 (the focus of Article 133, UCMJ, is the effect of the accused’s conduct on his status as an officer, and the test for a violation of Article 133, UCMJ, is whether the conduct has fallen below the standards established for officers).

and also

United States v. Lofton, 69 M.J. 386 (the elements of a violation of Article 133 are that: (1) the accused did or omitted to do certain acts; and (2) under the circumstances, these acts or omissions constituted conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman; conduct violative of this article is action or behavior in an official capacity which, in dishonoring or disgracing the person as an officer, seriously compromises the officer’s character as a gentleman, or action or behavior in an unofficial or private capacity which, in dishonoring or disgracing the officer personally, seriously compromises the person’s standing as an officer; an officer’s conduct need not violate other provisions of the UCMJ or even be otherwise criminal to violate Article 133, UCMJ; the gravamen of the offense is that the officer’s conduct disgraces him personally or brings dishonor to the military profession such as to affect his fitness to command the obedience of his subordinates so as to successfully complete the military mission).

In that last, and most recent case,, a senior officer, made unsolicited comments of a sexual nature to an enlisted woman as a means to further his attempt to establish a personal and unprofessional relationship with her, and that the enlisted woman lost respect for him as a military officer as a result of his comments. This was enough to uphold a conviction for conduct unbecoming.

I personally can not think of a standard of professional conduct whereby a commissioned officer, in a separate service, who is not in an individual’s chain of command, would be permitted to openly and publicly counsel a service member of lower rank on a military issue, much less in a public forum such as this. To do so without consulting the lower ranking service member’s chain of command is even more astonishing.

I see that the gremlins were out last night with their usual outrage, up in arms over a straw man position they constructed. It’s funny that they accuse “SJWs” of being perpetually outraged considering some of the vitriol being hefted at Myke.

“Sealions” = Comparing people calling you out online for saying stupid crap* to being harassed in your own home.

*Not only are the constant attacks on Torgersen et al. far more in-line with what the comic depicts (vs. responses on a blog post), I love how the comic is defending the character who made a brazenly-RACIST statement.

I am still of the opinion that homosexuality is incompatible with good order and discipline and I do not believe that the integration of gays into the military services will last. It was a political move made for political purposes by a CINC who hates the United States for the specific purpose of weakening the services. It has done that well.

That’s because you’re an idiot. There were gays in the military before DADT, there were gays in the military during DADT, and there are gays in the military now. To think that sexuality has something to do with “good order and discipline” shows an intrinsic misunderstanding of what those terms mean.

Also, you’re full of shit if you think that the repeal of DADT has weakened the service. The only thing that changed is that now we have service members who don’t have to hide their significant others or who they are. I was downrange when it happened. 🙂

Starting with an hominem attack is not going to impress me. I served 13 years in the Navy, including several years on ships, before being medically discharged due to a bad hearing loss and while it was true that there were gays in the Navy then, they kept their sexual proclivities to themselves and did not cause discipline problems.

The Gaystapo likes to pretend that the open integration of homosexuals into the uniformed services has been accomplished seamlessly, but that is a lie. They know it’s a lit and we know it’s a lie. I know for a fact that Sailors and Marines have been specifically warned against speaking out against the policy, but meet them in a bar after they have had a couple of beers and the stories they tell are infuriating.

Male-on-male sexual harassment/assault is just the start. It didn’t take more than 10 seconds for the open gays to realize that in any “he-said-I-said” situation, all he had to do is accuse the straight of “homophobia” and it was pretty much an automatic “get-out-of-brig-free” card.

This is no news to anyone who has been paying attention, and of course the gays and their supporters know full well it happens, but they treat the truth the same way they treat any other potential threat to their agenda. Insults leavened with threats and assorted other temper tantrums.

Don’t ask-don’t tell was working. There was no reason to change that policy. I fully expect that the services will return to that policy within my lifetime because what they are doing now is not working, no matter how badly you wish it did or whether it meets your political agenda.

I mean we’ll start with your linking sexuality to discipline issues like it’s only “gays” that cause issues.

No one said it was without issue. A lot of service members had to learn to adapt to the new world order pretty damn quick. Guess which group had issues? You won’t guess but it was the bigots such as yourself.

DADT wasn’t working. We were excluding people who were qualified and wanted to serve, and kicking out good soldiers/sailors/airmen who we already spent time training and supplying.

Your belief that DADT will be reinstated is laughable. The military already recognized same sex marriage and authorized those couples who were in states that didn’t allow it free leave so they could go get married somewhere they did. You think you can ask people to take their spouses off of their dependents form? Come on. You’re deluding yourself.

You’re an idiot and a bigot and I’m glad you washed out of the Navy. 🙂

Good gosh and golly! First another ad hominem attack, then an accusation of bigotry, then some very specious reasoning, and finally a repeat of the ad hominem attack and bigotry accusation.

Wow. How can I hope to prevail against a wonder-brain like yours? Oh well, feeble though my efforts may be, I’ll go ahead and give it a try.

First, despite your reasoning that gay integration into the uniformed services is a done deal that can never be repealed, you forget the simple fact that it all hinges on an Executive Order (EO) signed by Obama. EOs do not have force of law the same way that something passed by the Congress and then signed by the President would have.

Which means that what one President can impose, another President can remove, and Cruz (for one) has already stated that he will conduct a thorough review of ALL Obama’s EOs. Which specifically includes this one.

Mind you I am not saying he will rescind that policy, I am saying that, of elected, he can — and you can bet that he will be under intense pressure from a lot of people (including many men and women in uniform) to do so. Furthermore, if he did, you would be utterly amazed at just how fast it would happen.

Leftists in general and the Gaystapo in particular have had a very good run under Obama. Using judicial tyranny and EOs, they have smashed legislatures, overturned voters, hounded businesses, and imposed a virtual reign of terror on the uniformed members of the armed forces by means of the simple equation, “support gay rights or lose everything”. No room for personal conscience, religious beliefs, personal preferences, or anything like that. It’s their way or the highway.

The problem with a reign of terror, however, is that you must always have the upper hand, and as long as Obama is in office, I suppose they do. However, you might want start thinking about what will happen if the Democrats lose in 2016 and the GOP extends its majority over the Congress.

Oh boy. This will be fun.
Let’s start with the fact that I don’t say that your arguments are wrong BECAUSE you’re an idiot, which would be an ad hom. I say that you’re an idiot, then I proceed to pick apart your arguments. Insults can be ad hominem, but not all insults are. Let’s go into how wrong you are!

First, despite your reasoning that the repeal of DADT was an executive order, a simple Google search will reveal that you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about and that it was actually a bill that Congress passed. All that information is here…

Second… oh wait. You don’t make a second point. You just rant about them darn leftists and make up dumb shit like “Cruz will be under intense pressure from al ot of people (including many men and women in uniform)”. Hahahahahaha. You think that service members care about reinstating DADT? There might be a few, sure, but the majority of us are looking at things like the potential closing of the commissaries, the fact that they keep threatening to change retirement, the abysmal treatment of vets by the VA, and the fact that they’re spending billions on the F-35, a plane we don’t need or want.

And to conclude, if Democrats lose in 2016 and the GOP extends its majority over the Congress, maybe I’ll get more than a one percent raise. That’d be the WORST.

Executive order. Damn. Couldn’t even research the main point propping up your dumbass argument.

As former enlisted soldier and as an honorably discharged commissioned officer you are squarely out of line when you bring rank in. CWO Torgerson is not in your chain of command and you are acting as if you have the right to publicly square him away in your capacity as a commissioned officer. You do not have that right. Council between ranks is always done in private. Do you publicly attack the ensigns and lieutenants below you, or do you do so behind closed doors? If you do so in public then the Coast Guard I served along side has changed a great deal for the worst.

You want to castigate Torgerson as a civvie? No problem…but this was a dick move and beyond the pale.

Well, that could go two ways.
A) he didn’t bring it up because it would make him look bad to be doing this to a fellow officer in public
B) he didn’t bring it up because his resume is known.
C) OR, we’re not mind readers and you think you know what he was thinking….

Son, I’m not the one that’s trying to get more out of the text than the author put into it. If you want to know which it is, ask him. Instead, you’re just assuming some shit and then whining when people point out that isn’t what is written.

The basic of the Officer corp. is to have some sense of morality and the ability to make judgements even if unpopular for the greater societal good. Mr. Torgensen has articulately a heretofore normative view about the acceptiblity of homosexual behaviour that while not PC, is in keeping with the many peoples and has an equal right to such speech as any who would seek to shut down the conservation by asserting otherwise.

Making a judgement against the sexuality of your soldiers ain’t for the greater good of the society. All soldiers are entitled to outstanding leadership and the belief that their officers view them with respect. Congress, the Commander in Chief, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff made it clear that both heterosexual and homosexual soldiers are equal in the eyes of the DoD. To comdemn a soldier for their sexuality is to defy those edicts.

Awww, it’s cute that you think it hasn’t. I mean, the 2000 year anniversary of the publication of the first gospel isn’t for another 55 years, and the 2000 year anniversary of the death and Resurrection of Christ happens in approximately 18 years. But in this usage, it’s entirely possible to say 2000 years.

“It is cute that you think my religion hasn’t been around 2000 years even though I go on to explain that it hasn’t been around for 2000 years. I also don’t understand how the Christianity I know today isn’t anything like the Christianity of 1900 years ago”.

Mr. Cole, I find it hard to credit your claim of being an officer. One of the most basic elements of leadership is that – unless there is a real, immediate and pressing reason (e.g. safety, pusillanimous conduct in the face of the enemy, etc.) – calling someone on the carpet, particularly someone junior to you, is done in private.

Poor leadership, Mr. Cole. If I was assessing you, that would be a big UNSAT.

So…you don’t know that Cole is or was.an officer in the Coast Guard? I don’t know if he’s retired.

Dressing down people in public is one thing. This letter is not just “dressing down” people in public. Furthermore, Torgersen’s blog is wide open. Please…point out where he has “dressed down” someone in public.

Can you show me where Brad has ever made any comment regarding homosexuality under the aegis of his rank in the military?
Because if I read you right you are saying that Myke is justified in his actions because he does not assume his rank while criticizing Brad, thus separating his comments from the sphere of one officer criticizing another officer and instead portraying it as a civilian criticizing an officer.
Following this logic, any comments that Brad made regarding homosexuality should only be addressed under his rank if he explicitly referenced his rank while making those comments. So far I have not seen any comments that Brad has made about homosexuality, for or against, specifically under his military rank.

“… can you show me where in this blog post he made “claim of being an officer”, or even referenced his personal experiences?”
You said this in response to William Underhill’s criticism of Myke’s post which boils down to “It is unprofessional to criticize a fellow officer in the way you have done.”
I ask again, can you show me where Brad has ever made any comment regarding homosexuality under the aegis of his rank in the military?

I had never heard of you until I became aware of this post via a post on Brad Torgerson’s Facebook page.

I notice that in your blog you claim to be a junior officer in the U.S. Coast Guard, and a member of the I.R.R., amongst other things (including a “mercenary” and “spy”)

I also note that in your post here, you make a point of referring to Mr. Torgersen by his military title; and you take it upon yourself to publicly (indeed VERY publicly) counsel him upon how he conducts his military duty, as well as his judgment, and his ability to lead the men and women under him. You then conclude with the notation that he is “an officer but no gentleman”.

Please correct me if I am wrong, but it is my understanding that Mr. Torgersen is not under your command. In fact it is my impression that while Mr. Torgerson has recently been recalled to duty, you have not. I therefore assume that you are not a member of Mr. Torgersen’s chain of command, and have no first-hand knowledge of how he does or does not conduct his military duties.

I also assume, and please correct me if I am wrong, that before you took it upon yourself to write and publish this letter, you failed to contact anyone who actually is a member of Mr. Torgersen’s chain of command.

Therefore, as I understand it, you have taken it upon yourself to publicly question the judgment, professionalism, integrity, fairness and ability of a (Warrant) Officer, who is currently engaged in active service. You have publicly made statements which could reasonably be seen as undermining said Officer’s authority with those under him, and you have done so by both rank and name. You have done this even though you are not a member of his chain of command, and without consulting anyone in his chain of command. Furthermore you have done this even though you have never served with the Officer in question, and have no actual first-hand knowledge of his ability, dedication, or performance.

If the above is substantially true, I would respectfully suggest that it may be in your best interest for you to review the following legal cases that relate to “Conduct Unbecoming An Officer” as soon as possible.

United States v. Lofton, 69 M.J. 386 (the elements of a violation of Article 133 are that: (1) the accused did or omitted to do certain acts; and (2) under the circumstances, these acts or omissions constituted conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman; conduct violative of this article is action or behavior in an official capacity which, in dishonoring or disgracing the person as an officer, seriously compromises the officer’s character as a gentleman, or action or behavior in an unofficial or private capacity which, in dishonoring or disgracing the officer personally, seriously compromises the person’s standing as an officer; an officer’s conduct need not violate other provisions of the UCMJ or even be otherwise criminal to violate Article 133, UCMJ; the gravamen of the offense is that the officer’s conduct disgraces him personally or brings dishonor to the military profession such as to affect his fitness to command the obedience of his subordinates so as to successfully complete the military mission).

United States v. Diaz, 69 M.J. 127 (the focus of Article 133, UCMJ, is the effect of the accused’s conduct on his status as an officer, and the test for a violation of Article 133, UCMJ, is whether the conduct has fallen below the standards established for officers).

United States v. Ashby, 68 M.J. 108 (the criminal conduct sought to be punished by an Article 133, UCMJ, offense is the act of committing dishonorable or compromising conduct, regardless of whether the underlying conduct constitutes an offense under the UCMJ).

United States v. Schweitzer, 68 M.J. 133 (an officer’s conduct need not violate other provisions of the UCMJ or even be otherwise criminal to violate Article 133, UCMJ; the gravamen of the offense is that the officer’s conduct disgraces him personally or brings dishonor to the military profession such as to affect his fitness to command the obedience of his subordinates so as to successfully complete the military mission; clearly, then, the appropriate standard for assessing criminality under Article 133 is whether the conduct or act charged is dishonorable and compromising as hereinbefore spelled out – this notwithstanding whether or not the act otherwise amounts to a crime).

United States v. Conliffe, 67 M.J. 127 (the elements of Article 133 are (1) that the accused did or omitted to do certain acts, and (2) that, under the circumstances, these acts or omissions constituted conduct unbecoming an officer and gentleman; the focus of Article 133, UCMJ, is the effect of the accused’s conduct on his status as an officer, cadet, or midshipman; the essence of an Article 133 offense is not whether an accused officer’s conduct otherwise amounts to an offense, but simply whether the acts meet the standard of conduct unbecoming an officer; the appropriate standard for assessing criminality under Article 133 is whether the conduct or act charged is dishonorable and compromising, this notwithstanding whether or not the act otherwise amounts to a crime).

In short, Mr. Cole, from my research (which I admit is limited) the questions you probably need to be concerned with are this.

Did your decision to bypass Mr. Torgersen’s chain of command, and publicly counsel a soldier, (currently on active service) not under your command about the performance of his duty, reflect badly upon Mr. Torgersen’s chain of command?

Did your decision to publicly counsel a soldier under the command of another officer serve to undermine the authority of that solider’s actual commanding officer?

Did your publicly questioning the judgment, ability and performance of Mr. Torgersen undermine his authority and ability to lead the soldiers under him?

Was it foreseeable that any or all of the above might have an impact on the performance of Mr. Torgersen’s unit to effectively complete it’s assigned mission?

Do any of the above dishonor or disgrace you personally, so that it compromises your character as a gentleman or standing as an officer?

Did the complete disregard your actions herein show for both the chain of command, and for established military procedure, dishonor or disgrace you personally, so that it compromises your character as a gentleman or standing as an officer?

Did your publicly questioning the judgment, ability and performance of Mr. Torgersen, even though you lack any first hand information on the subject, affect your fitness to demand the obedience of your subordinates and complete a military mission to which you might be assigned? In other words, might the fact that you made public accusations against Mr. Torgersen, without any evidence or first hand knowledge of his ability or performance reasonably cause someone under your command to question your fairness or judgment as an officer?

Did your publicly questioning of the judgment, ability and performance of Mr. Torgersen, even though you lack any first hand information on the subject, and are not in his chain of command compromise your character as a gentleman or standing as an officer?

I’m sorry Maureen, I didn’t make myself clear.
It’s not the statements that are the issue here. Torgensen said something Cole doesn’t like, then Cole takes it and then creates an imaginative scenario where someone might feel a certain way, if they interpreted the quotes in a particular fashion, and the light was just right, and then says Torgersen is not doing his duty.

Cole has no fraking clue as to if Torgersen is doing is duty or not. That’s what he lacks first hand knowledge of.

Never having served with him, Cole has no first hand knowledge of how Torgersen leads his troops, how much time Torgersen devotes to his troops, or how Torgersen motivates his troops, or how Torgersen’s troops feel about him. Cole has no idea about Torgersen’s mission performance or reliability. None the less Cole takes it upon himself to publicly reprimand Torgensen for being a bad officer and not doing his duty.

You are 100% correct. I had no idea you were not being serious, honest and sincere when you spoke about having “a shitty understanding”, not knowing very much, and desperately needing to learn basic social graces. Given the level of understanding, intelligence, and professionalism you displayed in your original post (or “open letter”) I hope you can see why such a mistake would be an understandable one.

Be that as it may, your post DID go “whooosh” right over my head. Obviously I did miss your meaning, and again, I apologize.

In my defense however, the post has ALL the hallmarks of something Myke Cole would write! It is poorly thought out, lacks any sort of structure, is incoherent, rambling, and illogical. It is entirely unoriginal, unimaginative, and it really doesn’t make, or even have, a point. Not only that, but when you add in the semi-literate use of punctuation, the poor word choice, the extremely limited vocabulary, the obvious ignorance of the writer and the “Rube Goldberg” sentence structure, the post screams “Myke Cole” the way “La Persistencia De La Memoria” screams Salvador Dali, or Starry Night screams Vincent Van Gogh. It has ALL the signature hallmarks of your work.

I sincerely apologize for missing whatever witty or perhaps even sarcastic point you were trying to make, and for failing to catch whatever hip, pop culture reference you were making. I simply had no idea that you were you were making a conscious effort to deviate from your normal writing style, or that this was supposed to be in any way different from all your other works.

Again I am sorry for being so easily fooled, but every author has his or her own unique style, and Myke Cole’s is so distinctively his own.

I mean Hemmingway’s prose stands out because of it is simple, direct and unadorned. Fitzgerald’s writing is layered and packed with implications and meaning. Faulkner is known for his wonderfully long and rich sentences. Dickens work contains such detailed descriptions you can not only picture the scene in your mind, but you can almost smell and feel the setting. Myke Cole’s work is known for being the sort of dull, unimaginative, formulaic drivel that wouldn’t make a good 10th season NCIS episode, and for being written in a deliberately pretentious pseudo-intellectual style, using grammar best described as “execrable” and the sort of vocabulary one normally associates with a person who “..can’t wait till teacher lets them read chapter books”.

I am sorry for my confusion. It’s just that whenever I see a book that looks like the author took an old SG1 script and just randomly dropped in a series of cut and pastes from a Harry Potter novel, or a story that looks like it was the result of a drunken chimpanzee unsuccessfully trying to mate with a word processor, I just automatically think “This HAS to be written by Myke Cole!” I mean, that’s exactly the sort of stuff that Myke Cole is known for writing!

Again I am confused. You want to buy a copy of Mykes book? Are you completely out of cat litter? Desperate for another door stop? Unable to find any coasters for sale? Stocking up on winter fuel already?

If my review inspired you to buy a copy of Myke’s book, you might want to look up the meaning of execrable, unimaginative, formulaic, unoriginal, pretentious, nauseating, unreadable, drivel and vomitus before you part with any money. Yes, these words ARE the ones most commonly associated with Myke Cole’s work, but if they are inspiring you to buy something by Myke Cole… then to paraphrase the great Inigo Montoya, “I do not think they mean what you think they mean.”

(One more hint, when people say “Myke’s stories are about as original as a paleolithic hand axe” that’s not intended as a complement either.)

“Your repeated state­ments of your thoughts on homo­sex­u­ality in public
forums create the very rea­son­able appre­hen­sion among homo­sexual
mem­bers of the ser­vice that you hold them in con­tempt and will not
lead them to the utmost of your ability, will not look to their needs
and con­cerns, and may place them at undue risk. That this is surely not
your inten­tion is irrelevant.”

My direct supervisor is a teetotaler and disapproves of alcohol use and abuse. Following the logic that you laid out above, I should fear that my supervisor will try to kill either myself or my career because I like to drink with my buddies after work. This is patently dumb and untrue. Sorry to step on your swiftboating of Brad.

No. It’d be like if your supervisor decided that those who drank alcohol were the lowest of the low, and constantly denigrated them and treated them poorly in relation to those who didn’t drank.

Furthermore if you’re drinking while on duty then you should be worrying about yourself AND your career.

EDIT: Just to block any potential avenues here, I’m aware that you didn’t say you drank on duty. But someone is going to be homosexual whether they are at work or at home, so drinking isn’t really the best analogy.

So you have examples of Brad treating homosexuals under his command in that fashion? Give me a break son. Also someone who drinks is a drinker even when they are not drunk so I think that the analogy holds up pretty well.

If you want examples, perhaps you should ask the person who wrote the article? I’m very sure that you’ll tell me that Myke is not a reliable source, or some such thing. The point remains that if you’re mocking homosexuals in public where anyone can read, that a homosexual soldier is going to see that and read it as you not respecting or supporting them.

Of course you think that the analogy holds up well. You made it. Drinking or not drinking is a choice. It’s something you do. Being homosexual is something you are. Furthermore, with all of the problems service members have with alcohol, I’d much rather have a gay soldier that doesn’t drink than a straight one who does.

I don’t think you’re a sock puppet or anything, I’m just hoping that he’ll read these comments and maybe reply. Or maybe he has realized that this open letter was a really stupid idea and is trying to ignore it.

Please don’t smooche me, I don’t know where you’ve been. And there is this wonderful thing called google that can tell you all you need to know about the genetics behind alcoholism and homosexualtiy. Don’t take my word for it! Take a look, it’s in a book, Reading Rainbow !

How *dare* you compare *being* homosexual to the act of drinking in this context? Drinking, especially on duty, has well defined dangerous outcomes that are the direct result of a behavior that if engaged in while on duty endangers the lives of all encountered.

Being homosexual, on the other hand, endangers no one. The vast majority of rapes in the military (for example) are committed by heterosexual men, on and off duty. If we were to make an argument for a particular sexuality being dangerous, there is a lot more evidence that heterosexuality is than homosexuality, even though the premise is silly.

Brad did not say “what you do after hours is none of my business,” he told a man who he considers to be his nemesis that implying he was gay was so severe an insult that he had to retract it. You can’t *stop* being gay on duty. Any gay soldier under Brad’s command has cause to be concerned, if that is how he feels about gay people.

Sorry if my previous comment sent you to your fainting couch.
I don’t drink on duty and I’ve never raped anyone. You sure sound like you could use a drink though. I also think that you are assuming that I am heterosexual, reading peoples minds over the internet sure is a handy superpower.

You get an A+ for missing the point. The point is that it is an insulting comparison to compare people who are gay to people whose behavior is problematic and might be dangerous to others. I didn’t assume anything about your sexuality. Gay people are just as capable of being homophobic as straight people.

Brad Torgersen did not say the equivalent of “I don’t drink and I don’t think you should either”, but “I don’t have green eyes and I don’t think you should either — and I think people with green eyes are horrible and disgusting, so horrible and disgusting I wouldn’t wish green eyes on my worst enemy”. Homosexuality, bisexuality, etc, are traits like eye colors are, not behaviors like drinking is. And there is absolutely no equivalency in the “dangers” of homosexuality vs drinking.

Actually studies show that alcoholism can be influenced by your genetic makeup. I don’t want to post a bunch of links here and be considered a spam-bot but a little google can help you out. Here is a selection:
“Research shows that genes are responsible for about half of the risk for alcoholism. Therefore, genes alone do not determine whether someone will become an alcoholic. Environmental factors, as well as gene and environment interactions account for the remainder of the risk.*

As to homosexuality, according to a study last year at Northwestern Univeristy:

Dr Bailey said: “Sexual orientation has nothing to do with choice. Our findings suggest there may be genes at play – we found evidence for two sets that affect whether a man is gay or straight. But it is not completely determinative; there are certainly other environmental factors involved. The study shows that there are genes involved in male sexual orientation.”

There, I hope you’ve learned something. Both homosexuality and alcoholism spring from genetic predisposal as well as environmental factors. Educating people sure is a rewarding experience.

If this is your idea of fighting then you should join the military yourself so that you can tell the difference.

Oh I’m actively aggressive.
Are you saying that you don’t drink alcohol because you are afraid of being an alcoholic? I thought that you were just trying to make fun of me above by implying that I didn’t know the difference between casual drinking and alcoholism?
You aren’t very good at this.

If only you were actively interested in knowing what words mean. Alas…

The capacity for alcoholism has been linked to genetics. Casual drinking has not been. That you tried to conflate homosexuality ( a trait linked to genetics) with casual drinking shows a fundamental dishonesty in your conversational technique. Of course, I noticed that when your first response to was another false conflation, but I have yet to figure out if you’re just stupid or trying to pick a fight.

Wow, so your position devolves to life ain’t fair? Shouldn’t we as people of good will and common purpose endeavor to make life as fair as possible?

Also what happened to the big words? I was just getting all hot and bothered! Don’t tell me that you were just trying to make yourself look more intelligent to give your argument greater weight in the eyes of the onlookers, because that would be an intellectually dishonest rhetorical ploy.

No, not really, but I don’t have anything better to do right now, so I’ll keep on virtually slapping you around for a while.

In the military there are certain things that you just don’t do. One of those things is to publicly counsel someone outside of their chain of command. When Myke brought Brad’s rank into the matter that is exactly what he was doing.

Looking at this thread you sure have spent a whole lot of time defending him against all comers. So good job yourself. I don’t get it, you got a crush on him or something? I can sort of see the appeal but I like my men a little more manly and working class you know?

Wait, what? I think that I just showed you that homosexuality and alcoholism are both behaviors that are rooted in environmental factors and genetic predisposal. I’m not sure how that made your point since you argued the complete opposite.
And I’m sure that you can suck eggs better than I can, grandma.

I suspect that Brad’s religion condemns promiscuity, drunkenness, and gambling as immoral as well… I suppose that creates a hostile environment for folks whose recreational urges are in those areas as well…

Confusing believing that something is immoral with participating in a crusade against that particular sin is one of the most interesting strawmen of our time.

One apparently can’t hope for redemption of a sinner without hating them and doing one’s best to destroy lives, at least in your conception of religion…